To Matter
by Someone aka Me
Summary: He sees you, truly sees you. With him, you actually matter. :: Regulus/Peter, for Paula.
1. Peter

Written for Paula (Exceeds Expectations) as a part of the 2013 Gift-Giving Extravaganza.

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_Peter_

You fall in love with him before you've spoken a word to him.

You don't need words. You watch him move, and you're trapped. There's this glimmer of power that surrounds him, this confidence. He is a boy who moves like a man who knows that the world will fall at his feet if he asks, and you fall for that.

You have always wanted the world. You are jealous, and you can admit that to yourself, even if you never admit it to him. You are jealous of him. You want the world to respect you, to see a man of power when you move.

All they see, though, is tubby, tagalong Peter. And you hate that.

.

He _sees_ you. Nearly a year after you've fallen for him, he sees you, truly _sees_ you for the first time, and you know in that instant that he sees more of you than anyone else ever has. He doesn't just see tubby, tagalong Peter. His silver eyes meet yours, dip down to your feet and back up, and something glimmers in them that might even be approval.

You want to know what makes him different. You want to know why he can see what everyone else is missing.

.

One month later, you talk to him for the first time. Late in the library, trying to finish an essay that Remus has been done with for days and James and Sirius are putting off until the deadline — tomorrow, that is. He sits down at your table and there's still that glimmer of something in his beautiful silver eyes, and _Merlin, but you've fallen hard, haven't you?_

He looks at you and his voice is like spun silk as he says, "Hello, Peter."

"Regulus," you say, and it's the first time you've ever said his name out loud and you love the way it feels on your tongue. You're very proud of the fact that your voice doesn't crack a bit.

You don't remember the conversation any more, but it lasted too long and not long enough. You bolted back to your common room after curfew and you know your face must have been glowing.

.

It's six months after that when he first mentions the Death Eaters. You've heard the name from Sirius and you know you're supposed to be repulsed but his spun silk voice traces words of a powerful elite taking their rightful place and you want to be there when it happens. You want to be at his side, a part of the group that matters. You want to matter. You have always wanted to matter.

.

One month later, on the grounds, just before summer, he kisses you for the first time and leaves you starstruck. Your world has never felt so perfect; you have never felt so powerful. You could conquer the world, because you have him on your side.

There's still something in his silver eyes, only you're not so sure it's approval. It's almost predatory, and you can't decide whether to be frightened or flattered so you go for both and kiss him back.

.

You graduate two weeks later. You don't see him for too long and you throw away a thousand drafts of letters that are too long, too desperate. You see him at meetings, and the meetings are the only times you feel like you've made the right choice, the right decision — that this is the way that you will _matter_. In the other times, the in-between times, with him off at school and the rest of your friends moving on with their lives and moving in with each other and _living_, you doubt. You have always been a doubter. You are so easily swayed by silk-spun words but when the words are gone your conviction fades.

.

You meet him over Christmas holidays, just once and it is enough. You kiss him fiercely and he kisses you back with that something in his silver eyes and you fall in love all over again because with him, you always feel like you matter.

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He turns 18 and he graduates and you can tell that something's different. Something's broken in those beautiful silver eyes and you can't bear to see him broken and you try to kiss it and make it better but it doesn't work and you can see him slipping. "I'm sorry," he whispers to you once in the silence of the night and you're not sure he even knows you're awake until you murmur back,

"For what?"

He startles and he doesn't answer and you feel him slipping further away, and so you turn around and kiss him silently, and it's then that you notice he is shaking.

"Reg?" you murmur, your voice a startled whisper but he doesn't respond and you cup his cheek and feel the dampness and it scares you.

"What if I'm wrong?" he whispers brokenly and you know, you _know_ this is the crux of the matter but you don't understand, you don't understand.

"Wrong about what?"

And you know that isn't the right response and he shuts down and silently slips further away.

.

Three weeks later you find out he's dead. Just like that. One day he was alive, solid, tangible, and the next day just gone. Gone.

You can't fathom it. He was going to conquer the world, you think, and you can't understand how it possibly could have conquered him. He's 18. Eighteen years old and he's gone.

You feel broken, deflated. He was the reason that you _mattered_, and now that he's gone you don't and it terrifies you, because that's really all you've ever wanted.

He's dead and you don't matter. He doesn't matter. He can't matter when he's dead.

You cry, but only when you're alone.

.

You don't cry when you sell them out. Even though you've finally started to understand what he meant that night, finally started to understand what he was apologising for, you don't cry for them.

You realise that Halloween night that you truly don't matter at all. You never mattered. You were never anything but a pawn to any of them. You were a game piece, a chess move, a calculation. A number.

Not to him. He looked at you and you still don't understand how but he _saw_ you.

No, you don't cry for them. You've used all your tears on him, because he was the one that mattered.


	2. Regulus

_Regulus_

You're sixteen when you notice him, _really notice him_, for the first time. You see a boy, deflated, dejected, used. Usable. There's fire inside him. You look him up and down and your gaze lingers a bit too long and you _see_. You remember your brother's comments about a boy who needed a bit more help than the others, and you know, instinctively, that this is that boy, a boy that everyone else overlooks. You won't make that mistake, because you know that those everyone overlooks are frequently the most dangerous tools. After all, people have a tendency to overlook _you._ Always the youngest child, always the afterthought. You thought that maybe after Sirius's fall from grace you'd be noticed, but apparently it doesn't work that way.

You can tell when you look at him that even as you see him, he sees you. He _sees_ you, _Regulus_, not just Sirius's brother. You store that image for later examination, quirk the corner of your lips at him, and move on.

.

One month later you find him alone in the library at a table with parchment sprawled in front of him and you sit down without much contemplation. He looks at you with something akin to adoration and you bask in it, unused to the unabashed emotion in his eyes — this boy is clearly not a Slytherin, you think, and then you realise that you've thought it fondly rather than derisively and that's the first time you notice that your feelings toward him are not what they should be.

"Hello, Peter," you murmur.

"Regulus," he says, and your name sounds like music on his tongue.

You make a witty comment and he laughs and time slips through your fingers like it's made of sand until you notice that curfew has slipped away with it and you chuckle as he panics and dashes off.

The chuckle stays on your lips longer than you expect it to.

.

It scares you when you realise that you're falling for him. You only ever meant for him to be a tool, but you can't get over the fact that he sees you for you. He adores you, and you love that. But it's more than that. Merlin, but you look at him and you see a world of potential, and you're almost jealous. He could be _anything_. And you love having a hand in deciding where he winds up. It's a rush, heady and intoxicating. Addicting. Enchanting.

.

You're very careful the first time that you mention the Death Eaters to him. You aren't surprised when he knows what they are — the name has been whispered in all sorts of circles by now — but you are surprised when he hears you out despite that and his eyes don't lose the admiration. You know how to play it, you know that. You may love him but you aren't a fool for it. You play all the right cords to string him along (and the first bit of doubt niggles at the back of your mind but you shove it down and ignore it).

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One month later you kiss him for the first time. You're sitting on the ground just talking about school and friends and life and you can't help yourself because the _way _he _looks at you_ and you want to kiss him so you do. You know that he loves you. You aren't unobservant; he isn't subtle. It's a risk, you know. You're getting in too deep; this is dangerous. You're a fool after all.

But here, in this moment, you don't care. You don't care about the risk, you don't care about the long run, and you certainly don't care that you might be ruining him as a tool. You don't care. Or, rather, you do care. About _him_. And that terrifies you and exhilarates you all at once and you're caught up in it and you can't get enough.

.

Two weeks later, he graduates and leaves you and you knew it would happen but that doesn't stop it from aching because _dammit you're in too deep and you miss him._ You try to write him a thousand times but it never comes out right and you hate it, this loss for words, because you have never felt so helpless. You see him at meetings (and something inside you aches and says neither of you belong here and it's all your fault but you stuff it in a box in the back of your mind and you ignore it).

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Christmas holidays come and you find him, just once, but that's enough. He kisses you promptly and you kiss him back without hesitation and it scares you how much this matters to you.

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You graduate before you see him next and you know immediately that he can see that you are changing. You don't know what you believe in anymore but it isn't death and that's all you see. He kisses you and you know he just wants to fix it but this isn't something kisses can fix — because it's not just you, it's the _world _that's broken and that's too big for him or anyone.

"I'm sorry," you whisper once in the broken spaces of the night to his back as he lays behind you and you startle when his voice comes from the dark.

"For what?"

You feel the weight of your world land on his shoulders and you hate that he's suffering for you but you don't know how to take that away from him and you're just so confused that you can hardly bear it anymore and it threatens to shake you apart. He kisses you and you desperately want to kiss him back and pretend it's all okay but you can't and you know he notices.

"Reg?" he asks and you hear the surprise in his whisper as his hand comes up to cradle your cheek and it's only then that you notice that you're crying.

You can't put the weight of your doubt on him because that's not his burden to bear because if you're wrong you've _ruined_ him, but you have to say something and the words slip out without your permission.

"What if I'm wrong?" The whisper is as broken as you feel, but you know immediately, intuitively, that he doesn't understand and maybe it's better that way.

"Wrong about what?" he asks and you can't answer and your doubt grows and it's consuming you until you can't remember what it feels like to be sure of anything anymore.

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Less than three weeks after that conversation you finally make your decision. You're wrong. You've been wrong all along. You've destroyed him, led him astray, and you can't really bear that. You don't know how to tell him so you don't. You martyr yourself instead because you _are_ a fool (and maybe there's a bit of Gryffindor in you after all) and you can't think of any other way to redeem yourself but this. This is the only way to free him from the prison you've caged him in.

This will break him, you realise. Or perhaps it will make him. Perhaps you are the only thing keeping him trapped. You remember the look of adoration in his eyes when he looks at you and the way you knew he could be so much more than he was, and you think of how you've warped him, twisted him into your own version just because you _could_, and you wonder if this is what everyone else means when they think of love.

You hope not. You hope the rest of the world isn't as twisted as you are.

You die with his face on the backs of your eyelids and his name on your lips and the hopes that this disappearance of yours will set him free.


End file.
